War Priest: The Complete Series, page 120
“Does it, though?” asked Meosa as Arik and the illusionist took their seats at the table.
Tayaura shrugged. “People like to be distracted by anything that can distract them. It’s why most illusionists don’t even have to use Chimaura to accomplish their tasks. Anyway, eat. After our meal, we’ll discuss what needs to happen later today. There are several working parts that we’ll need to address. We also need a few contingency plans.” She offered the group her version of a cautious smile. “But let’s worry about all of that a bit later.”
****
Tayaura left with Koharu to get supplies in Avarga. While there was plenty at the Hidden Warrior retreat for them to use, they needed clothing that would get them into the kitchen of Kogu’s banquet hall, which Meosa had joked they should have saved from the last time they were in a kitchen in the Crimson Realm.
“You have to admit, disciple, kitchen work is calling the two of you. And tell me again why you ruled out sneaking in using barrels of ale this time?”
Arik slowly shook his head, unable to hide his smirk. “That was terrible.”
“I’ll bet it was.”
He looked over to his sister, who was now seated on the front porch of the retreat. Arik joined her. “Hey.” He didn’t expect her to respond, and was surprised when she looked up at him. “Mori? Hi. Hey. I wanted to tell you more about tonight, what we’re planning to do.” An idea came to the disciple. “I also want to show you something.” Arik took a seat in front of the girl, the disciple on the ground, his sister with her legs crossed under her body on the porch. “Just watch.”
He closed his eyes. Arik began focusing on the Revivaura all around him. Once he could visualize it fully, he shifted to Chimaura. He then thought of Hojo’s face, the man’s sharp features, his beard stubble and the way his eyes always held a strange combination of mystery and kindness.
“Ah, if it isn’t the master illusionist,” Meosa said once Arik blinked his eyes open again to see his sister.
“Good, right?” he asked her. “This man was my teacher. He taught me how to use Chimaura. You already know I can use Revivaura. Want to see?” Arik produced a kunai from his boot, one that came from a makeshift sheath that Tayaura had crafted for him the previous day. Mori Ehara continued to watch as Arik showed her his palm. He brought the blade across it and drew a wound.
At the moment the blood started to drip, Arik healed himself. A pair of droplets still made it to the dirt, but the wound was completely healed by the time they did.
“That’s Revivaura. That’s why I wasn’t home with you. I was learning to do that.”
To his surprise, his sister came forward and took his hand. She examined it and smoothed her finger over the spot where the wound had just been. Has the medicine been working all along? Arik watched as she moved back to where she had been seated on the porch.
“That’s the most activity we’ve seen from her in several days,” Meosa said. “And all you had to do to get it was cut yourself. Neat!”
“We can’t give her any more of the ning root. Not a chance. It doesn’t take well with her. I don’t want to see her suffer.”
“I didn’t suggest we do that. But I do suggest we try to entertain her. What do you say, disciple? No one is around. Care for a little playful sparring?”
Arik gauged the space before the retreat, the land flat with patches of dying grass and windswept leaves. “Sure. I’ll be right back, Mori.”
He returned a minute or so later with his two swords, the top half of his robes now removed. He kept the Whispering Sword and gave the kami Hojo’s blade.
“Ready when you are,” Meosa said. Arik got into position, and as he did he was thrust upward by a pillar of water. He came swooping down, the disciple screaming just as he was catapulted back into the air. “Just fight me in the air, disciple. Let’s entertain her!”
In the air?
Meosa suspended Arik and the two clashed. The disciple soon got the hang of it, yet Meosa was always in control. Looking to make the fight more dynamic, Meosa threw his voice and cried out in agony at Arik’s strikes, sometimes rallying just to add more dynamics to an already ridiculous scene.
By the time they were done, Arik was completely drenched, the disciple glad to touch down in front of Mori Ehara. Meosa spiraled into existence next to the disciple. “Bow, disciple.”
Arik bowed alongside the water spirit. He kept his head down with Meosa as they awaited a response, perhaps some clapping, from his sister. This never happened, but Arik did look up to see a half-smile on her face.
It brought him incredible joy.
****
Tayaura returned with supplies alongside Koharu, who bobbed her head as she walked, the bakeneko clearly thinking of some song. There were kitchen smocks for them to wear over their robes and a type of makeup Arik hadn’t seen before in his shinobi tool kit. The illusionist also had shackles for Mori Ehara.
“We can’t,” Arik said upon seeing the shackles. “She’s showing more signs that she knows what is going on. I don’t want her to be chained up here.”
“It won’t hurt her,” Tayaura said.
“What if the place catches fire? How will she escape?”
“She can’t come with us, if that’s what you’re suggesting. And why would the place catch fire?”
“You never know,” Arik told her.
“I’d babysit again, but I’m sort of needed with what we plan to do. And it’s a good plan.” Koharu morphed into the form of a man with a shaved head, his jaw covered in beard stubble. She now wore the same off-gray smocks that Tayaura had placed on the table. Even if she was now in a male form, Koharu still spoke in her voice. “I’m ready to do some cooking.”
“And I’m needed as well,” Meosa reminded the disciple. “Even though no one has been clear what my exact role will be in all this.”
“Just let me talk to her.” Arik approached his sister. He took her hand and led her outside. The disciple sat Mori on the porch where she’d been earlier. “We have something to complete tonight. Once we complete it, this life, the one I’ve been telling you about, is over for good. There will be no more sneaking around or anything of the sort. We will teach about these things, but they won’t be something we take part in like we do now, Tayaura and I.”
Mori Ehara’s eyes twitched and then settled on Arik.
“I need to ask you to stay here tonight. After, we are going to do what we can to help you without the ning root, or anything that’s painful,” he said, even if he didn’t know exactly how the itako would treat his sister’s condition. “Can you stay here tonight by yourself? Please make some indication that you can, and that you won’t go anywhere. I don’t want to shackle you here; I don’t think that’s necessary. I know you can hear me. Please, just give me a sign.”
Arik waited for something, anything, that would indicate that his sister understood him. He was mere moments away from sighing and turning away when she reached her hand out to his arm and squeezed it, the disciple only realizing then just how close he was to her.
“You understand?” he asked, feeling the same elation he’d felt earlier in seeing that she was starting to recognize him. “Good. Good! We will be back right after, I swear. But…” Darkness fell over the disciple considering what he was about to do. “I need to get ready.”
He entered the retreat to find Tayaura standing before the table, looking at the box with the spider inside. “Kill it, kami.”
“I’ve never tried to drown a spider before, but I suppose it won’t be that hard.” As if he were a ghost, Meosa pressed through the table. He popped his head out of the spider box. “It’s dead, shinobi-ess. Happy?”
Tayaura produced a wool sponge that she had picked up in town that came in a small wooden box. Using some of her black shinobi make-up, she marked one side of the sponge with several X marks. She placed them on the table to let the black make-up dry. Tayaura took out a kunai, which she also set on the table. After returning with a small saucer that had a few drops of water in it, she used a pair of cooking utensils to retrieve the dead spider from the box.
The Mogra Red was several times larger than the one that had bit Tayaura in the southern desert, its body red with black spots along its abdomen. “These ones are bred as pets,” she said, answering a question at the front of Arik’s mind.
She never answered his next question. Why?
Tayaura flipped the spider around and placed it onto the saucer. She cut into its body, just below its neck, which caused a yellow liquid to excrete into the water in the saucer. Tayaura used the utensils to turn it around and squeezed the spider, which produced more yellow venom. It mixed with the water, which Tayaura later stirred with the tip of the kunai. She then let the side of the wool sponge that wasn’t marked soak up the mixture.
“And it won’t absorb through?” Arik asked, not certain of what she was doing.
“Not with this type of sponge. It is the same kind that used to come in shinobi kits.”
“Why did they stop putting them in the kits?” Meosa asked.
“Because the sponges became popular and it got to a point where you could get something comparable anywhere. But the best are from sellers of shinobi items, and I know a guy here in Avarga who still uses the original wool sponges produced with the same method as they were hundreds of years ago.”
“He was a strange fellow,” Koharu said, the bakeneko still in her bald male form. “But he was nice.”
“And you’re sure?” Arik asked as Tayaura put the sponge back in its wooden box. She took the box to the kitchen and used two pieces of thin parchment to wrap it.
“Of course I’m sure, disciple. I’ve seen my father do this very thing. It will serve its purpose, but we’ll need to clean our blades after. It’s time to get dressed. The kitchen staff is showing up soon, and we have to be part of that group.” Tayaura checked the other herbs she had boiled down earlier. She transferred this liquid into a glass bottle and corked it. “And your sister?”
“No shackles,” Arik said. “I spoke to her. She won’t leave.”
“Good to hear. In that case, let’s prepare. The night is ours.”
****
The make-up that Tayaura had purchased was chunky to the point that it gave texture to Arik’s face that made him look as if he’d survived a fire. After it dried, she further enhanced this look with shu, a vermillion red ink. Using the stone pencil that all shinobi kits seemed to come with—the pencil was toxic if swallowed—she deepened some of the natural lines created by the thick make-up. In the end, Arik hardly recognized himself. Koharu, who had watched the whole thing, seemed equally impressed.
“I’ve heard about you illusionists and your make-up skills, but I’ve never really seen what you are capable of. You are almost a bakeneko with transformations like that. Or a kitsune. Yes, kitsune. Let’s not put you on the same level as a bakeneko such as myself.” She laughed playfully. “And you’re next?”
“This won’t take long,” Tayaura told Koharu. The illusionist gave Arik a mirror for him to hold in front of her face. She spoke as she applied the make-up, which made it look like Tayaura was having a conversation with herself. “You will pull double duty at the beginning,” she told the bakeneko. “First, you’ll need to lure the head chef out so you can replace him.”
“Luring humans is a specialty of mine.”
“I’m sure that is the case, but there will be false shinobi around.”
“We’ve already established that on our trip to Avarga,” Koharu reminded Tayaura. This led Arik to wonder how they had gathered information in the first place. He assumed Tayaura had simply used her conical hat to keep a low profile—something that wasn’t unheard of in the Jade Realm—while Koharu morphed form a few times to get the info she needed.
“We also have me,” Meosa reminded them. “Are we forgetting everyone’s favorite water spirit? You’ll be able to get the chef out of there and return as the new chef, with two very well-disguised assistant chefs. I hate to say this. I really hate to say this. In fact, I almost can’t say this.”
“Say what?” Arik asked.
“I trust the illusionist and her plan, and it’s going to work.” Meosa sighed. “She knows what she’s doing, and if she doesn’t anticipate any complications, I don’t anticipate any complications. And to be clear: I’m willing to take one for the team here. If I need to swoop in there and drown Saiyo Haro before he can stop me, I will.”
“Saiyo is mine,” Tayaura said with finality.
Meosa sighed yet again. “We’ve already established that, shinobi-ess. And we’re really going out on a limb here to give you the kill you so desperately want. Remember that.”
“All will go according to plan. Please give me a moment to finish.” Tayaura focused again on her make-up.
Once she was done, she looked like a woman who had been working in kitchens since she was a young girl, the signs of age and constant work in a smoky space evident on her face. The problem of their swords was addressed by a canvas bag that Tayaura had retrieved from the market. Arik had actually seen cooks move with these before, the bags filled with their knives, favorite pots and pans, and often food.
Genius, he thought once Tayaura was fully dressed in her chef disguise, the illusionist with the bag slung across her back. To make the bag bulkier, she added some of the kitchen supplies from the retreat, the various concoctions she now carried, her kitsune mask, and the poisoned wool sponge in its wooden box. She had Arik do the same thing, both of his swords hidden within. All they would need to do later was mask up and strap their sheaths to their belts.
Before leaving, Arik approached his sister yet again, who now sat in a chair by the window. “We’ll be back later.”
“We sure will,” Koharu said as she produced one of the cherry plums, a fresh one that had been purchased that morning. Mori Ehara took it. A crooked smile lifted the corner of her cheeks. “See you soon, girlie. When we get back, it’s off to Iga!”
“First we have to go to Minami by way of Mount Osore,” Arik reminded the bakeneko. “But after that, we’ll be in Iga.” The disciple glanced at Tayaura, who now waited by the door. “By then, everything will be better.”
****
Koharu had been totally correct in the assessment of her skills to both infiltrate the estate and lure the chef out. Even so, Meosa had gone with her in case things got out of hand. Arik and Tayaura were waiting in the shade of an alley, one next to a place that sold hand-hammered crates, when the bakeneko approached, the chef in tow.
“What’s the meaning—?” Before the heavyset man could say anything else, Meosa suspended him in the air and slammed his back against the nearest wall.
“Quiet,” he told the chef as Koharu took the man’s form. Meosa lowered the man as Tayaura approached with a small vial of the same drink she’d given the shinobi last night. She popped the cork out of the top and Meosa took over from there. The chef lowered his shoulders mere moments later, as if the tension had drained from his body, his face relaxing into a drunk stupor. Soon, a bit of drool appeared on his lip.
Meosa lowered the chef; Arik rushed over to the man to make sure he was propped up in a way that he wouldn’t choke on his own spit. The disciple suppressed the urge to heal the man as he joined the others, who now stood at the entrance to the alley.
“Lead the way,” Tayaura told Koharu.
“Righty righty,” the bakeneko said, now using the chef’s voice.
It was only a few blocks to the estate, the streets of Avarga growing increasingly busy as the afternoon pressed on. Once they neared the entrance, Meosa went forward to cause some commotion, which had the two false shinobi guards looking for the source of the sound when Koharu, Tayaura, and Arik slipped inside.
They took a path that ran adjacent to the main building of the estate, the place crawling with false shinobi. Arik spotted guards at every door and on the rooftop. They also patrolled the courtyard, which made it a wonder they’d gotten inside in the first place. Then again, their disguises were some of the most elaborate Arik had put together. They clearly worked, and Koharu straightened everything out once she returned to the kitchen to find other chefs busy preparing the evening meal.
“Additional help,” Koharu said aloud to the men and women. “I worked with these two back in Iga, at a school there. They were in town, and I figured this would speed things along. And don’t worry, I’m paying them. No one’s pay is being cut.”
Arik didn’t really know what to do until he saw Tayaura move to another room to set her bag down. He joined her to find the illusionist already removing some of the items from her bag, including her sword, the bottle of boiled ning root, her kitsune mask, and the wool sponge.
“Place your swords under here,” she said after she found a canvas table cloth, which she used to cover the items. “Your mask?”
“I’ve got it,” Arik assured her as he flitted his hand across the front of his robes, the Mask of the Fallen inside.
“We need to make ourselves look busy until the banquet starts.”
Koharu came in. “You.” She pointed at Arik, and spoke loud enough for the others to hear. “Start washing pots. You can help with cutting,” she told Tayaura.
“Washing pots?” Meosa grumbled in Arik’s ear. “It’s like she enjoys ordering us around. I’ll say one thing, disciple, you’re going to be doing all the washing here. My job is to make sure the three of you aren’t spotted in some way. I’ll also take a look around just to know what we’re up against. A headcount is in order. Exciting, isn’t it?” he asked as Arik placed his swords on the counter, both of them going under the canvas tablecloth. “If this works, it’ll be fast and easy. If it doesn’t, we’re all in for the fight of the century. If that’s the case, I hope that cat has claws.”
